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Chapter 27 - Ethical Platform of Assisted Reproduction

from VI - Practice Issues

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 November 2022

By
Julianne Zweifel  and
Jeanne O’Brien
Edited by
Sharon N. Covington
Sharon N. Covington
Affiliation:
Shady Grove Fertility, Rockville, MD
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Summary

Patients who were once unable to have a child without assistance and patients wishing to have a child with desired traits are now eagerly seeking increasingly complex reproductive plans. These plans commonly involve multifaceted ethical concerns that may not be apparent to patients. The clinicians involved in patient care, including the medical team and mental health professionals, while beholden to reproductive ethics, may vary in terms of their perceptiveness of ethical concerns, their working constructs of medical ethics, and their comfort with addressing ethical concerns. This chapter endeavors to increase the clinician’s depth of understanding and skill in navigating and balancing reproductive ethical principles. In an examination of the core constructs of reproductive ethics, the chapter provides nuance on autonomy and challenges the reach of reproductive liberty.The perspectives of virtue ethics, including parental obligation to the child, feminist ethics, care-based ethics, and communitarian ethics are introduced.Finally, a seven-step decision-making process for considering and addressing ethical concerns is provided.

Keywords

reproductive ethicsclinical decision makingassisted reproductionprocreative libertynonidentity dilemmaautonomyvirtue ethicsfeminist ethicscommunitarian ethicscare-based ethics
Type
Chapter
Information
Fertility Counseling: Clinical Guide , pp. 274 - 281
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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